It was past seven o'clock in the morning the next day, and the sky was still not bright.

Song Biao didn't sleep well all night, and called Zhao Tingzhu and Xue Changqing to his room very early to discuss things, he believed that the establishment of the Manchurian Infantry Regiment was already a sure thing, and the key was that Brigadier General Madenidov lied that he had 3,000 brothers, but he actually only had more than 800 people in his hands.

He did have more than 1,000 people stationed in Wujiatun, but more than 200 people in it were horse gangs recruited by Xue Changqing and Lao Jintou.

No money can not recruit people, the Manchurian infantry regiment has not yet been officially approved, and military expenditures have not been settled, but fortunately, Song Biao intercepted the Russian army's transport convoy twice, plus the dead people's wealth, and seized 420,000 ruble tickets and more than 60,000 silver yuan before and after.

When he came to Shenyang this time, he had a hunch that he would always spend money on activities, so he brought 420,000 rubles of tickets with him, and another 40,000 silver yuan, leaving only 20,000 silver yuan for Yang Tiesheng to dispose of in Niujiabao.

In fact, he was also worried that he was taking too much risk, and he might be taken to Niujiabao's lair by the army, so it was best to bring all the cash with him, and he would have a chance to turn over the book in the future.

Xue Changqing often travels between Shenyang and Huichun, and knows many people.

Song Biao gave Xue Changqing a sum of money, first went to Shenyang City for some activities, and recruited as many literate people as possible, preferably translators who could understand Russian, while Zhao Tingzhu went to buy a batch of papers, preparing to post announcements in the towns around Shenyang City to recruit new soldiers.

As soon as Xue Changqing and Zhao Tingzhu went out, Brigadier General Madenidov hurried to Song Biao's residence.

At this time, Li Fugui burned a pot of hot noodles for Song Biao, and boiled two poached eggs.

Brigadier General Madenidov was waiting in the courtyard, Major Turgenier was also there, and there were four other Russian officers who Song Biao didn't know, all of whom seemed to be direct officers of the Far Eastern Army Commander's Staff, and they were also about thirty years old.

Song Biao glanced at it, and just by looking at the rank and collar badges, he knew that there were three captains among them, and one major should be a subordinate staff officer of Brigadier General Madenidov, especially the major who was about thirty-five years old, he was very much like a Central Asian of Turkic descent in Xinjiang Province, and he was not tall and slightly thin.

Brigadier General Madenidov looked very happy and said with a smile in his thick Moscow-accented Russian when he saw Song Biao come out: "Song, our business is done." ”

Anyone who learns Russian knows that the Moscow accent is always the most painful, and of course, this is never the point.

Song Biao was greatly surprised, and asked a little disbelievingly: "So fast?" ”

Brigadier General Madenidov nodded solemnly and made a gesture for Major Tuvaniel to show Song Biao the official approval of the headquarters.

Song Biao hurriedly threw the dishes and chopsticks to Li Dayun beside him, and hurriedly took the order in Tu Vanier's hand to take a look, and glanced at it with great joy, it was simply overjoyed, not only did it very happily, but the treatment was almost equivalent to the level of the Russian army.

This decree, signed by Army General Kuropatkin, commander-in-chief of the Far Eastern Army of the Tsarist Russian Empire, officially approved the appointment of the "Manchurian Infantry Regiment, with Major Kornilov as the staff officer and senior adviser of the infantry regiment, which is directly under the jurisdiction of the Manchurian Bureau of the General Staff of the Far Eastern Army, and the General Staff Department will allocate materials and supplies for the establishment of the regiment, and after the completion of the project, according to the standards of the front-line troops, 250,000 rubles will be issued every month for all military expenses except for the replacement of firearms, ammunition, artillery, and horses."

In addition to the commander-in-chief's personal approval, the General Staff of the Tsarist Far East Army also issued a plan for the formation of the Manchurian Infantry Regiment signed by Brigadier Madenidov, requiring the Manchurian Infantry Regiment to be organized into three infantry battalions, a cavalry battalion, a transport battalion, and an engineer battalion by March 1905, and an additional artillery company directly under the regimental headquarters.

Slightly different from Song Biao's original idea, Brigadier General Madenidov emphasized the addition of a cavalry battalion, which also fully shows that his request for the Manchurian infantry regiment was to eliminate the Kwantung bandits.

Brigadier General Madenidov himself stepped forward and pointed to the blank box on the order and explained: "This matter is indeed so urgent that I did not know your official Russian name when I confirmed the order. If you have one, just fill it in now and I'll stamp it for confirmation. ”

Song Biao thought for a while and said, "Don't Ao. Vladimir. Surname. ”

Brigadier General Madenidov nodded slightly, motioned to Major Tuvaniel to fill in the name, and then introduced the Russian major of Central Asian descent to Song Biao: "This is Major Kornilov, he has been responsible for liaising and organizing the local armed forces in Manchuria before, and is proficient in Chinese, and he is the staff officer and senior adviser of the Manchurian Infantry Regiment is the agreement between me and Commander-in-Chief Kuropatkin." ”

Major Kornilov took the initiative to stretch out his hand and shake hands with Song Biao very seriously, and said: "From now on, you are the commander of our Manchurian Infantry Regiment, I hope you can lead us to the final victory, and my colleagues and I will do our best for this!" ”

Song Biao bowed slightly, looked at the Russian captains behind Kornilov, and roughly understood that these were the first Russian advisers of the Manchurian Infantry Regiment, and immediately replied to Kornilov very simply: "Let's work together, everyone!" ”

Brigadier General Madenidov still had a lot to discuss with Song Biao, so he raised his hand and pointed to the hall, and took Major Kornilov, Major Tuvaniel, and Song Biao into the room.

He directly took out the operational map of the Shenyang area first, spread it out on the table, and said to Song Biao: "The General Staff has issued a new combat and deployment order, Song, you must arrive at Yangguantun, which is five kilometers away from here, before the 22nd, which was originally part of the garrison of the Siberian Second Army, which suffered heavy losses in the Battle of Liaoyang, and the reorganization of the Second Army with other Siberian legions, which has been roughly transferred to the right flank front west of Sujiatun. Your task is to garrison Yangguantun in advance, before 7 o'clock in the evening of the 23rd, General Mishuchenko's Kuban Cossack cavalry will arrive at Yangguantun to join you, you must set off in the morning of the next day, transport supplies to the Gukou area in advance, General Mishuchenko's cavalry will set off lightly on the night of the 24th, arrive at Gukou on the morning of the 25th, and launch a sudden attack on the 1st Brigade of the Yueben Cavalry stationed in the Shendanbao area at noon on the 25th. Your mission is to transport supplies, and make sure they are safe from attacks by bandit forces. After General Mishuchenko captures the position of Shendanbao, you will continue to assist in the defense of Shendanbao, and before March, I will find a way to transfer you back to Shenyang and continue to be stationed in Yangguantun, and at the same time officially take charge of the work of clearing out bandits. ”

Song Biao nodded slightly, and said, "Okay, I'll arrange for someone to go to Yangguantun first in the afternoon, as for other things, you don't have to worry, it's not a very difficult thing for my troops." The problem now is that I have too few people, you reported a scale of 3,000 people, in fact, I only have 1,000 people, you know, I have to find a way to temporarily recruit some new recruits in the past two days. In addition, if we were to be responsible for the transport and protection, the firearms and ammunition would have to be brought in first, and the horses and wagons in particular would have to be deployed as soon as possible. ”

Brigadier General Madenidov said: "I have already arranged everything for you, on the basis of the material application you asked Tuvanier to transfer yesterday, I will make a slight adjustment, and the materials that are urgently needed at present will be all available before the 22nd, and the rest will be replenished before March." This is a list of all the ordnance that I have re-approved, and if you look at it, this is the official approval, and if you need other supplies in addition to this, you can only find another way in the military appropriation. ”

After saying this, he asked Major Tu Vaniere to hand over a five-page list of approval documents for the establishment of the regiment to Song Biao for his attention.

Song Biao was overjoyed when he took it and glanced at it, he could only say that the Russian army's work in this area was still very refreshing, because it was established according to the establishment of six battalions, and the basis for the establishment of the regiment ordnance was calculated according to 3,500 people, that is, the legendary reinforced regiment.

On this basis, the General Staff of the Far Eastern Army allocated 4,200 Mosin Nagant M1891 rifles at a time, including 700 cavalry versions of the Mosin Nagant rifles, and the extra 20% was equipped with reserves, with 500 rounds of ammunition per gun.

A total of 520 Don and Siberian war horses, 330 light and medium-sized horses requisitioned locally, 75 four-wheeled carriages, 120 Kanto two-wheeled light carriages, 20 detachable sleds, 200,000 catties of rough material per month, and an additional 20,000 rubles for military expenses, which were requisitioned on the spot.

Others, including engineering and fortification equipment, such as shovels, etc., are counted, including marching tents, etc., and more urgent materials are deployed to Yangguantun before the 22nd and collected on the spot.

Some of the supplies that were not very urgent and that were difficult to draw for the time being, including 4,200 sets of winter uniforms, medicines, sabers, a number of field guns, six Makqin heavy machine guns, and grenades, could only be replenished by March.

After carefully reading the list, Song Biao was still very satisfied, after having these basic materials, he did not have much ammunition to spend money on replenishment in the future.

He put the list away and said, "Okay, that's pretty much it." ”

Brigadier General Madenidov said: "Considering the shortage of manpower on your side, after the Battle of Arthur, some of the soldiers of the original defense area troops have escaped and returned, and there has been no formal reintegration for the time being, this afternoon, Major Kornilov will go to transfer part of the troops to form an infantry battalion." Therefore, you only need to recruit hundreds of additional people to form two infantry battalions, and the cavalry battalion does not need to be fully formed for the time being, the key is that the transport battalion and the engineer battalion must be properly prepared, which is your main task at this stage. ”

Song Biao thought about it in his heart, feeling that it would be very difficult to organize a transport battalion and an engineer battalion in two or three days, and the best countermeasure was to urgently recruit a group of horse gangs and laborers in the Fushun area, especially to recruit some miners, who could come in handy without retraining, at least to be able to complete the transportation and engineer work alive.

He nodded slightly and said, "I will find a way to solve these two problems." In addition, if there is no way to allocate machine guns to me for the time being, can you find a way to solve the dozen boxes of ammunition, I have six German-made Maxim machine guns in my hand, which were originally captured by the army. ”

Brigadier General Madenidorff sighed and said, "It's not a big problem, I'll do my best to arrange it for you." It is very difficult to directly report some things to the plan for approval, the safety of our homemade grenades in Harbin and Siberia is low, your troops have not received complete training, and it is more dangerous to use these grenades directly, and the price of grenades imported from Germany is relatively high, and the quantity is not much, so it is impossible to directly submit them for approval. However, I have already made arrangements for Major Tuvaniel to buy you a batch of supplies from the other reserve troops before the 22nd, and the money is for you to pay for yourself, and you can probably buy five or six boxes of a hundred pieces each. Machine guns can't be bought, the reserve forces will check them regularly, and the ammunition can be sold to you, and it doesn't matter how much you buy. ”

As soon as Song Biao heard it, he understood what Brigadier General Madenidov meant, the Russian army is in this situation now, the internal chaos is unbearable, and the generals of the reserve forces privately sell supplies to other troops.

This situation is a bit like buying food stamps in the era of the planned economy, where each unit is supplied according to the plan, and the plans of the second-line troops are generally not used up, so they secretly sell them to those troops who are in urgent need of supplies.

Song Biao estimated that the cost of this kind of internal transaction would not be too high, so he nodded and agreed.

Brigadier General Madenidov is the senior staff officer in charge of logistics, at this stage is the busiest time, entangled in official business, and Song Biao explained, he can't wait to leave first, Major Tuvaniel stayed and talked with Song Biao about buying supplies, and then also left, only Major Kornilov stayed, and discussed with Song Biao the formal formation of the Manchurian Infantry Regiment.

After discussing with Major Kornilov for a period of time, Song Biao felt that this major of Central Asian descent was still a very good candidate, probably because he was also a minority in the Imperial Army of Tsarist Russia, and he did not have obvious discrimination and arrogance against Chinese and other Asian races, and this Major Kornilov has been responsible for contacting and guiding the work of bandit armies in various places, and he still speaks Chinese very well in Kanto, and he also knows more about the Kanto region and the people in the Northeast, and the two sides are easy to deal with.

Because of the urgency of time, many problems were basically too late to be solved, and after a general discussion, Song Biao made a simple division of labor with Major Kornilov, he was responsible for forming a transport battalion, an engineer battalion, and two infantry battalions, while Major Kornilov was responsible for activities in the Far Eastern Army Headquarters, whether it was deployment or purchase, first trying to find a way to get as many arms as possible, and in addition, as much Russian infantry as possible to form a reinforced battalion of the third infantry battalion.

In fact, in the Tsarist era, the Russian army did not pay much attention to the construction of battalion headquarters, and its army system was basically based on companies as grassroots units, and more than a dozen companies were organized into a regiment, such as Cossack cavalry and Siberian infantry regiments, and many times seventy or eighty companies were organized into an army.

Compared with the army, the Russian army still has a very strong ancient European military characteristics of the feudal lord period, its soldiers are very brave in combat, its officers are also trained in accordance with the army system of Germany and France and other countries, and it has even set up a new military change of the general staff, but on the whole, the Russian army has not yet established the modern army system of Germany in the real sense, and once a large-scale operation occurs, the Russian army is extremely chaotic in terms of overall command and operational scheduling.

In the conversation with Major Kornilov, Song Biao could clearly feel this, Major Kornilov actually did not have the concept of a battalion headquarters, Song Biao proposed to build a reinforced battalion to expand combat effectiveness, and Major Kornilov's understanding was that two more companies could be set up.

Song Biao did not discuss this issue in detail with Major Kornilov, and after reaching an agreement with Major Kornilov on the distribution of division of labor and cooperation, he took people to Yangguantun.

At this time, Yangguantun was already an empty and lonely village, the villagers were expelled by the Russian army, the surrounding land was barren, and hundreds of houses and earthen houses were requisitioned.

After hanging up the Russian-language official card of the Manchurian Infantry Regiment Liaison Office and the garrison station here, Song Biao returned to Fushun Wujiatun, where he recruited a group of horse gangs, and went to Fushun Coal Mine to recruit more than 100 miners.